Meta

In all of life, we experience the belief of opposition. We cannot experience beauty without the belief of ugliness. We cannot experience joy without the belief of despair, and so it goes, light and dark, male and female, tall and short. As we learn to accept this opposition, and that life delivers contrast from moment to moment for our experience and growth we open a oneness with all life that comes as we flow through change. We begin to see the world from the creator’s perspective, understanding the truth of our identity, living with grace and ease without forming opinions or creating judgments.

When I chose the name of my coaching practice to be My Big Skinny Lyfe I was working through a very difficult event in my life where I learning that I wanted to live big so that I could give big. However, to live big it was important to eliminate the thoughts and feelings about the skinny-nesses in my life. I learned that a flexible, open and loving attitude for others and myself helped me to manage my life with grace and wisdom despite my living through the results of residual choices about myself and my life. We all have skinny-nesses that keep us living small in the world, such as, unworthy-ness, unlovable-ness, cynical-ness, anxious-ness, dark-ness, old-ness, negative-ness, not enough-ness, small-ness, and other Skinny-ness which separate us from our true identity and allows us to live big.

Plotinus says, “Let the body think of the Spirit as streaming, pouring, rushing and shining into it from All sides” We all have an internal recording that plays throughout the day, some are better than others are, louder or more constant yet it does exist for each of us. Checking in with this internal recording gives us clues to the contrast we see. The contrast of skinny-nesses to our desires to live big guides us to identify what we want in our world. Often we verbalize the skinny-nesses for reasons such as, a rationalization for our “yeah-butts,” or a plea for others to validate our big-ness as we feel ourselves unworthy of living big. As we verbalize these skinny-nesses, we create more of them. Belief that we are worthy of receiving goodness makes the mind and body healthy and whole. Accepting the best of ourselves assists us in creating clearly defined boundaries that guard us from attacks that may diminish us. Acknowledging our worth reminds us of who we are, what choices are for our highest good and it essential in creating balanced life strategies that, in turn, will move us to joy.

In some circumstances, it may be difficult to see that goodness is happening all around us and we are stuck in our Skinny-nesses. Nothing gets us moving toward joy, and living BiG, faster than gratitude and service. Gratitude allows us to gain the creators perspective while service focuses us outward. There are emotions that are part of gratitude such as, love, happiness, optimism, and joy. Gratitude in action is a great power. Activating the energy of gratitude in yourself and those around you changes your environment, relationships and perception of the world.

BiG LYFE Tip: My mom always says, “If you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say anything at all.” Practice noticing the opportunities to play a negative recording and simply choose to be with what is.

George Bernard Shaw expressed, “Progress is impossible without change, and those who cannot change their minds cannot change anything.” I invite you to take a moment now to change your mind and to bring gratitude into your current circumstances. Remember a time when you felt filled with gratitude and feel it fully in your body now. In your mind ’s eye, visualize a large movie screen in front of you. You see your life playing on the screen. Notice all of the players and their environment. Notice what they are feeling as you are stuck in your skinny-nesses. Notice your interactions with each player. Notice all what you are hearing them say and other sounds around you. Notice the color hues of the movie as it plays. Is there one that stands out the most to you? Notice how the environment smells, any textures that you see and feel. Notice the temperature you feel on your skin. As this movie comes to completion you notice a second movie screen next to the first playing a movie of your life filled with gratitude. Notice the feelings of gratitude in your body as you watch the players interact with each other. Notice the environment with all of its sights and sounds. Notice the colors and textures you are seeing. Notice how the environment smells and even the temperature on your skin. Now you begin to notice all of the differences between the first movie and the second. As you notice the changes you feel compelled to share the feelings of gratitude that fill your body now with all of the players on the screen. And as you do so, you notice a single color, sound or feeling on the skin that is shared with the players and it fills them. Now slowly merge the two movies screens together and notice the congruence as the players share the resource of gratitude. Notice how your body feels as you wake up tomorrow morning, throw off the covers, and you are filled with these feelings of gratitude. Notice your interactions with others as you move throughout the day, the week, the month, the year. Take a look back on your life and notice the generations that have followed you and how they too are filled with gratitude. Notice how their lives are different because you chose into gratitude. Notice how they are sharing their gratitude for you with you as they move through their lives. And come back to today, bringing with you all of the feelings and knowledge you have just gained and notice what you are feeling. As you feel complete, gently open your eyes and notice how you feel in your body, and your mind.

H2O (Heart to Others) Project: To deepen your experience, create a Gratitude board out of poster board. Put it in a place where you will see it often each day. Each day, add an entry that reflects what you are grateful for and invite others to add their gratitude to the board. Notice the change that happens to your physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual self as well as your relationships as you fill your world with gratitude.